By Kenneth C. Crowe II

Published 10:21 pm, Thursday, July 11, 2013

The hard feelings about the ballot-fraud scandal that tinged city politics for three years appeared again at the City Council meeting Thursday night.

The City Council resolved two separate lawsuits to pay former City Clerk William McInerney and four other employees money they did not receive in 3.5 percent raises in 2010 and 2011, the last two years of former Mayor Harry Tutunjian's last term in office. The back pay for the five totaled $22,820.

The raises should have been given under the city's policy for giving employees not represented by a union the same raise as received by CSEA members. All five positions are considered to be patronage positions.

Council members had no issues with paying Penny Bashford, former confidential secretary to the corporation counsel; former Personnel Director Al Spain, who is the North Greenbush supervisor; Jeff Pirro, former Tutunjian spokesman; and Prudence Pechenik, Tutunjian's former confidential secretary. Their payments were approved 9-0

McInerney, however, was different, The council voted 7-2 to pay him, but not after some debate.

McInerney had a role in some Democrats' attempts to cast forged absentee ballots in the 2009 Working Families Primary.

McInerney pleaded guilty in a plea deal to one count of second-degree forgery, a felony. He was sentenced in March to 90 days in a work program. McInerney was a prosecution witness in the ballot-fraud trials of former Councilman Michael LoPorto and county Democratic Elections Commissioner Edward McDonough. They were both acquitted.

Councilman Rodney Wiltshire, an at-large Democrat, said he was opposed to paying McInerney given what happened and that he held a patronage position.

The payments amount to 85 percent of what each person would have received with a 3.5 percent raise each year.

The only person not included in the settlements was Michelle Delair, the former deputy city clerk and city clerk, who did not sue. She is running as the Democratic candidate in the 3rd Council District.